The use of collaborative systems, e.g., conferencing systems such as immersive telepresence systems, enables parties who are not at the same physical location to efficiently assemble such that information may be shared. Many conference sessions include the use of a whiteboard which allows one participant in a conference session to write on the whiteboard while other participants in the conference session may see what is written on the whiteboard. When a conference session includes at least one participant who is participating from a remote location, e.g., is not in the same room as a whiteboard that is in use, a camera may focus and zoom in on the whiteboard so that the participant who is participating from the remote location may view the whiteboard.
A whiteboard may generally be an important feature of an immersive telepresence system. However, as a whiteboard may not be in use all the time during a session, a camera within an immersive telepresence session may be controlled to zoom in on the whiteboard substantially only when the whiteboard is in use. While a camera may be manually controlled by a user interface device to zoom in on the whiteboard when the whiteboard is in use, it is often inefficient for an individual to be responsible for manually controlling the camera.
Many immersive telepresence systems include a microphone that is specifically positioned to pick up sound in the vicinity of the whiteboard. In some instances, when a microphone positioned near a whiteboard detects voice activity, the camera may be automatically controlled to zoom in on the whiteboard. However, as an individual talking near the whiteboard may not necessarily be writing or drawing on the whiteboard, zooming in on the whiteboard when voice activity is detected at the whiteboard may not be effective in efficiently zooming in on the whiteboard when the whiteboard is in use.